Posted on 07/08/2003 11:11:14 AM PDT by Tailgunner Joe
Spurred on by the Supreme Court's landmark ruling decriminalizing gay sexual conduct, both sides in the debate over gay rights are vowing an intense state-by-state fight over deeply polarizing questions, foremost among them whether gays should be allowed to marry.
Even with most legislatures out of session until early next year, lively debates are already taking shape across the country, from Hawaii to Connecticut, Oregon to Alabama to Massachusetts. Potentially fierce battles over marriage and other rights loom in dozens of statehouses and state courts, as social conservatives — including the Senate majority leader, Bill Frist of Tennessee — try to breathe new life into a proposed constitutional amendment that would effectively ban gay marriage.
In dozens of interviews this week, activists, pundits on both sides and legal scholars from across the political spectrum said that with the Supreme Court's June 26 ruling in Lawrence v. Texas, the country was at a revolutionary moment akin to the aftermath of the decisions in Brown v. the Board of Education, which banned school segregation, and Roe v. Wade, which legalized abortion.
"The right wing is really galvanized by this, throwing down the barricades," said William Rubenstein, a law professor at the University of California at Los Angeles and the faculty chairman of the Williams project on sexual orientation law.
At the same time, he said: "Gay rights activists are excited and want to go the next step. On the one hand the Lawrence decision gives advocates an enormous weapon in their arsenal, and at the same time it will mobilize opponents of same-sex marriage in ways we haven't seen."
Most agreed that the question of whether the United States will allow gays to marry would become the next major focus of both the gay rights movement and of social conservatives, now that the Supreme Court effectively removed what has been used by many states as the basis for discrimination on a wide array of civil rights questions.
A decision last month in Ontario to extend marriage rights to same-sex couples, which is expected to go into effect for the whole country by the end of the year, making Canada the third country after the Netherlands and Belgium to allow gays to marry, is also bound to put the gay marriage question on the front burner here.
"America has hit a tipping point in which fair-minded people now support equality and inclusion for gay people and most Americans are ready to accept marriage," said Evan Wolfson of Freedom to Marry, an advocacy group in New York.
"We are in a Brown v. Board of Education moment right now," Mr. Wolfson said. "The Supreme Court has said in the strongest possible terms that love and intimacy and family have deep constitutional protection for all Americans and that gay people have an equal right to participate. This gives us a tremendous tool for moving forward to end the discrimination."
"At the same time," he added, "it is important to remember what came after Brown: major legal challenges and acts of courage but also fierce resistance."
Glenn Stanton, senior analyst for marriage and sexuality at Focus on the Family, a national organization opposed to gay rights, agreed there would be resistance. "I think that what will happen is that states will be seeking to say, `You know what? Don't bring any of that stuff here,' " he said. "We know what we want, we know what marriage is, and we know what sexual relationships are. They will be asking how they can protect life as they know it, rather than life as the Supreme Court tells them it's going to be."
State gay rights groups and social conservative groups are preparing for legislative and court fights.
"These are the first shots in the largest battle in the culture wars since Roe v. Wade," said Brian Brown, executive director of the Family Institute of Connecticut, a conservative group. "The people of Connecticut are not going to stand for this."
He added: "Politicians in Connecticut will have nowhere to hide. You'll have to choose a side. Either you support traditional marriage or you radically redefine it."In the 2003 legislative session, Connecticut, Montana and Rhode Island debated bills that would permit same-sex marriage, all of which died, according to the Human Rights Campaign, a gay advocacy group.
No state permits same-sex couples to legally marry, but in 2000, the Vermont Legislature conferred on gay couples in the state all of the rights married couples enjoy, but that does not entitle them to hundreds of federal rights or rights of married couples in other states.
In seven states, bills that would create civil unions similar to Vermont's were introduced, the Human Rights campaign said, and they died in all but two — California and Massachusetts, where they are pending.
Thirty-seven states already have what are called Defense of Marriage Acts, saying that marriage is between one man and one woman. In 2003, 10 states introduced bills that would either create one, if they were among states that had no defense of marriage act, or would prohibit recognition of same-sex marriages, civil unions or domestic partnerships forged anywhere else. Some of those states, including Texas, already had Defense of Marriage Acts but were seeking to expand them. Of those, only the Texas bill passed.
Gay rights groups said that even as they are emboldened by the Supreme Court ruling, they are also preparing for a backlash, especially in more conservative states.
Alabama is considered by gay rights activists to be one of the most resistant states to gay rights.
"Some people in our organization are very concerned about a backlash," said Ken Baker of Equality Alabama, a gay rights group. "We'll deal with it if it happens."
Another major battlefront is the courts. There are dozens of pending cases across the country relating to child custody, adoption, employment discrimination and gay marriage. Two court cases brought by couples seeking to legalize same-sex marriage in Massachusetts and New Jersey could yield landmark rulings.
The Massachusetts case, brought by Julie and Hillary Goodridge, who were denied a marriage license, could be decided this month.
A ruling for the plaintiffs would make the state the first to legalize gay marriage. Some social conservatives are already preparing.
"We're looking at this closely," said Len Deo, president of the New Jersey Family Policy Council. "Things are going to heat up. The next legislative session I'm sure is going to be feisty around these cultural issues."
Did I miss anything?
Good points. Another is that since homosexuals in general, and men in particular, are wildly promiscuous, the whole idea of monagamous "marriage" is only a politcal ploy for sympathy, appealing to peoples's sense of fairness and justice and sentimentality. They want nothing to do with marriage in any sense of the word. They want to change the world into a bordello that makes them feel comfortable and normal people shoved into the closet.
Meaning that we have to hire crossdressers, can't use the word "homosexual" (as in Britain), employers having to provide benefits to "partners", kids in school learning about fisting and whatnot, "Gay Pride" parades down Main St. USA, being fired if we express the wrong viewpoint about sexuality, etc.
Because two people of the same sex have never, in the history of civilized societies, ever been able to marry. You can take your argument and use it to cover a man marrying his mother, or his father, or daughter, or two brothers, or a gang of friends, etc.
The end of the argument is that there is an absolute unchangeable standard of wrong and right, and homosexuals and their supporters don't like that and want to shove their moral relativism down our throats. I personally have had enough and am going to fight it with every ounce of my being for the rest of my life.
I've seen Dilly's posts before and he is a total 100% homosexual supporter and gets rather unpleasant about it. There is no room in conservatism for the promotion of sexually deviant behavior. Healthy dialogue about aberrant sexual behavior means telling the truth about it, not kowtowing to homonazis.
You people should read the dictionary before you use long words. A theocracy means being ruled by non-elected religious hierarchy types - mullahs, priests, etc. It does NOT mean a government whose laws are informed by traditional moral codes.
http://www.freerepublic.com/~dilly/
This account has been banned or suspended.
What they really want is for the rest of us to tell them they are okay, healthy, good, and normal despite the manifest evidence to the contrary. If they cannot persuade or deceive us into accepting that queer equivalence, they will employ the coercive power of the state to attempt to shut us up.
Correction: you don't choose to be male or female. You are born either male or female, and sexual attraction to the opposite sex is powerful congruent natural consequence of that fact.
To engage in homosexual behavior, you must choose and act to override that powerful and congruent sexuality that is the birthright of males and females.
The fact that in most gay and lesbian relationships one partner typically adopts an aggressive "male" role and the other adopts a more passive "female" role is further evidence that the male-female complementariness is strongly in-born.
In sum, you do not "choose" to be heterosexual--it is natural and congruent consequence of male-ness and female-ness. You choose to be homosexual as an unnatural and incongruent behavior set.
What I have found especially saddening (in the past, now I am starting to get righteously angry) is all the non-homosexual acting but sympathetic sheeple. Young people, old ladies (such as my late mother), people who have bought the propaganda. I talked to one young lady today at the supermarket about it. She said the usual "I don't think it's healthy or moral, but they should be allowed to do what they want in the privacy of their own homes." When I tried to prove that that isn't what they want, she got angry.
None so blind as those who don't want to see. But this message of truth has to get out - that they do not want to be left alone, they want to rule the world.
It is NATURAL to BECOME a heterosexual so that is why the majority "choose" to be that--it comes down to conditioning and what you are exposed to as a young child. It is also a learned behavior, so to say.....Most male homosexuals were molested as teenagers or boys by men who recruited them for their lifestyle (see Hitler's brownshirts and their association with the youth groups in Germany--Roehm is a good example). Childhood situations can set one up to be very susceptible to that nihilistic behavior and it can be taught to one who is young and confused and has no concept of right and wrong. You especially see boys now that have no father at home who are targets for gay men. I know a man in prison, but he only got 6 years, for molesting two brothers who had "no" father and "no" religious training.
Apparently you forgot the sarcasm tag, but just in case you didn't, you are generally comparing apples to oranges - as the old saying goes. Your response is totally irrelevant to the discussion as making a choice of WHO of the opposite sex is not the same as the choice of WHAT sex to be attracted to.
The Phag agenda is repeatedly revealed several posts over within this thread, so I won't use Jim's bandwidth just to restate it for you. The Phags know there is no pride in being "gay" or "lesbian". Period. They know there is little chance of "straights" naturally being "proud" of the queer lifestyle, gaining their "pride" only through public apathy by intimidation or through legislation.
"Faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful."
Those who kiss up and deceitfully agree it is one's "right" to be perverted are the enemy.
if you're so sure, why not call their bluff?
They want to change the world into a bordello that makes them feel comfortable and normal people shoved into the closet.
yeah, that's what they want. they want to change the world into a bordello. if we do not stop them you will soon be forced to sell yourself and all of your family members as prostitutes or else be forced into hiding. it's all part of the "vast gay agenda."
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